Have two contractors show up at your house with the same bids. One is in well-tailored work clothes and his truck is sparkling in your driveway. The other is dressed like a slob and his truck is full of dings and it looks like it hasn’t been washed in a months. You go with the clean-cut guy every time.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a just a some people thing. Lots of low income people are obsessed with their car/keeping it clean.

yea, I don't know about this. go drive around Bethesda or McLean, and then, I don't know...Anacostia or Suitland and tell me where the cars tend to be more well-kept/clean.

+1. It’s actually relatively expensive to keep a car professionally detailed. Poor people have rent to worry about and most poor people don’t have much pride for the crummy car they drive.

Everything must be perfect — cars, house, physical appearance, kids’ clothes — is an upper middle class Type A thing.

I was raised LMC. My dad repaired our vehicles - he buffed out scratches, popped out dings. Our cars were always shiny and looked new. Some people just like cars that look nice.

You sound like a judgmental bptch-whore, though, OP. Congratulations!

Anonymous wrote:This is a just a some people thing. Lots of low income people are obsessed with their car/keeping it clean.

yea, I don't know about this. go drive around Bethesda or McLean, and then, I don't know...Anacostia or Suitland and tell me where the cars tend to be more well-kept/clean.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you sure she was raised affluent? IMO, the people who are the most concerned about things like this are the ones who weren't raised wealthy and have something to "prove."

+100 new money/striver behavior

hmm, really? I'm not new money, or any "money" at all, really, but I like having a clean car (especially the interior). It's just my preference. I don't think it's harmful. Now, I'm definitely not a "I wouldn't be caught dead" in a dirty car type of person...I get it cleaned/clean it when I have time. but still- I do make an effort to keep it looking nice. Maybe it's precisely BECAUSE I am not rich, and our cars are definitely big purchases (and we tend to keep them a decade or longer) that I try to keep them in good shape. Who knows?

I'm type A and like everything around me to be clean, tidy and to run like a well oiled machine. I also have the funds to make this happen.

Because I feel it reflects poorly on me if my car is dirty / dented.

Same goes for our home.

WE have two soccer playing kids. my husband and I both have well paying jobs, own a DC home, beach house and investment property and we drive shitboxes. I just can not be bothered to worry about a pristine car when I know the world will ruin it. So what's the point?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you sure she was raised affluent? IMO, the people who are the most concerned about things like this are the ones who weren't raised wealthy and have something to "prove."

+100 new money/striver behavior

That’s a needlessly derogatory way to look at it. I grew up dirt poor, and my mom was very diligent about keeping her car looking nice, washing it frequently, cleaning the inside, parking at the far reaches of the parking lot so she wouldn’t get dings, etc. It was because she took pride in the fact that she worked hard and saved diligently to afford a decent car (which was nothing special, it was a used Saturn), and she was going to have to drive it into the ground so she knew she needed to take care of it if she didn’t want it to look like total shit in 10-15 years. And, in her words, “we may be low class, but we don’t have to look low class.” She was a single mother in a time and place where lots of people looked down on single mothers, and she didn’t want to play into any stereotypes of the loser single mother.

That’s the way we grew up generally, taking impeccable care of our things because we knew replacing them wasn’t an option. I still do it today with my own things even though we have plenty of money, not because I’m showing off or pretentious but because I can’t let go of the mindset of needing to make sure everything lasts as long as it can.

Anonymous wrote:People like this care way too much about how they are perceived. That's it.

Yup. Typically anxious and insecure.

Go to Nantucket. The older/more beat up the suv, the older the money.

I’m a UMC soccer mom that works full time. My 2011 CRV is trashed during soccer season. I get it detailed twice a year - after our last November tournament and after our Memorial Day tournament. I ignore the back seat for the time periods between those detailings.

Anonymous wrote:This is a just a some people thing. Lots of low income people are obsessed with their car/keeping it clean.

There was a guy in a nice neigbhorhood, not uber rich, but nice area, would wash his car (I think it might have been a Lexus) everyday on the driveway.

I like the inside of my car tidy. I hate trash and food crumbs inside my car. Thankfully my kids have grown out of the super messy in the car phase.

People like this care way too much about how they are perceived. That's it.

This is a just a some people thing. Lots of low income people are obsessed with their car/keeping it clean.